GODS DELIVERANCE OF MAN by PRAYER AND Mans Thankefulnesse to GOD in PRAYSES In a Sermon by reason of the Lecturers absence in the Church of Saint Bartholmewes EXCHANGE on Ash-Wendesday at the Generall Fast proposed But at that time by a Company of CHURCH Intruders very rudely opposed And now at this time for the publike satisfaction of All men faithfully in Print exposed By I. G. D. D. Rector there LONDON Printed for Thomas Paybody dwelling in Queenes Head COURT in Pater-Noster ROVV 1642. TO My Parishioners of St. Bartholmews Exchange London Respective or Disrespective all manner Salutation ON our Fast Day doubly a Fast Day by Ancient use by Recent Authority The Curate by the throng of people in the Church not able to get in I began Prayers The Exhortation and Confession were endured But the Absolution entred on A Psalme was confusedly began I read They sang rather howled Such was the rudenesse of the swervers from their owne Congregation and Disturbers of all Congregations whether they intrude Intreated I was to be take me to the Pulpit I yeelded The Lecturer being not come as I conceived In the Pulpit I was outfaced in every corner of the Church disgracefully nicknamed outprated rudely and savagely Having got through my Prayer I propounded my Text Such were the Yellings they would not endure the reading of it for all my deep charge and citing of the disturbers to the Lords Tribunall Well downe I came and Master Ash The Lecturer then come went up rebuked the disorder orderly Preached and soundlie In the after-noone I finished my worke And here You have it to review Which my Prayer is may be to your Aedification in the serious way of Right Christianity The loving Pastour of you All Iohn Grant D. D. PSALM 50. 15 Call upon mee in the day of trouble I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorifie me IN the forenoone few Auditors of those many had the patience so much as to heare my Text named I hope to finde you in a better temper this afternoone however here I am againe to doe my duty and from the Lord of Hoasts is my message It is the charge of that supreme Generall to all Call upon me in the day of trouble I wil deliver thee c. A heavy loade of trouble is on our shoulders yea on our soules a loade for us unsupportable we have long burdened our God which our sinnes and his judgements have we felt many wayes to our smart I would I could once say to our amendment Wee are now under a generall humiliation a fast by publique authority enjoyned the whole Kingdome and the first day falls on Ash Wednesday a solemne day of fasting in the Church of Antiquity in the purer times of the Gospell when Ionah the Prophet and Messenger of the Highest to Niniveh the great the Head City of Nations began to enter therein as his Commission served him he cryed and said yet forty dayes and Niniveh shall be overthrowne Ionah 3. 4. what followed so the people of Niniveh beleeved God and proclaimed a Fast and put on Sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them For the word came to the King of Niniveh and he arose from his throwne and hee laid his robe from him and he covered him with sackcloth and sate in ashes and he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Niniveh saying Let neither man nor beast heard nor flock tast any thing let them not feed nor drinke water but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily unto God Yea let them turne every one from his evill way and from the violence that is in their hands Who can tell if God will turne and repent and turne away from his fierce anger that we perish not And God saw their workes that they turned from their evill way and God repented of the evill that he had said that he would doe unto them and he did it not Our danger is as neere for ought we know and as great we may feare as was that by Ionah threatned unto Niniveh Nay Gods judgments have beene and are upon us in much Variety we are all a publique Fast a Fast by the highest authority over us on earth solemnly proclaimed and sadly enjoyned O let it not be a mock fast in a bulrushed Popishness or Pharisaicall disfigured-nâ—ss what ever our outward garments deportments abstinence be betake we our selves to ardent prayers and unfained resolutions to shake off all our exorbitances and sacrilegious actions and intentions god-robbers can be no right fasters neither the robbers of the honour due to his great name nor of his Church revenews the maintenance of those set a part to the administration of duties holy and of Gods owne appointment for the best wellfare of his people Gods sword is drawne and will not be sheathed till we be amended Gods wrath is out and will not be recalled in till our sins be cast out the troubles on us shall not be mitigated but multiplied not remitted but increased not away removed but with armies of new ones aggravated till we be not humerous but ingenuous in our humiliations Soon and easily may we be deceaved and deceave each others but God is not cannot will not be mocked by any of us all he is serious be not wee ludicrous regular be out approaches and addresses unto him and the blessing of our text will come home into our bosomes God will make us a yet more happy nation then ever we have beene and we shall be the trumpeters of Gods prayses all the world over The Contents and extents of our present text are these A deep Invocation A seasonable exaudition A due returne of Thankfulnesse Call upon me in the day of trouble there is the first the deepe Invocation I will deliver thee there is the next a seasonable Exaudition And thou shalt glorifie mee there is the last of thankefulnesse a due returne a glorifying of the deliverour out of troubles in trophyes of prayses Call upon me in the day of trouble a deep Invocation Out of the depths have I cryed unto thee O Lord is the Psalmists expression Psalme 130. He was plunged in the depths of sinnes and in the depths of Calamities for sinnes committed None can sinne and escape unpunished bee they never so high in worldly estate or in the favour of the highest presumptions have precipitations and heights of sinne have their depths of punishment Gods owne people are not priviledged from miseries when against God they doe harden their hearts provoke him tempt him grieve him with their transgressions when they doe erre in their hearts and will not know his wayes Israel like troubles upon troubles involve even them and till they humble themselves in repentance unfainedly no hope of entrance is there at all into his rest When sinne one depth hath plunged us into misery another depth and misery into sorrow another depth it is then high time to take hold on the
his Fatherly affections chayned And marke it he wills us to call upon him importunately but so resteth not hee prescribeth us formes of prayer in his sacred word puts the matter into our hearts and the very words and tearmes into our mouths Hence it is that the spirit by the Prophet is called the Spirit of grace and of supplication Zach. 12. 10. Hence that also of the holy Apostle The Spirit helpeth our infirmities for we know not what wee should pray for as wee ought but the Spirit it selfe maketh intercession for us with groaning which cannot bee uttered And hee that searcheth the heart knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit because he maketh intercession for the Saints according to the will of God Rom. 8 26 27. Alasse faulty and guilty are wee all of us and durst not without warrant and enablement approach unto our God the troubles on us would even overwhelm us and as it were keepe us from so much as looking up were we not thus amiably invited thereunto Call upon me in the day of trouble What troubles of â—â—te have these three kingdoms under one Soveraigne been cast into Nay still are in and under Our sister Nation Ireland even weltreth in bloud and burneth in mutuall enragements none there secured of his life scarce for a moment and are not we or we ought to be surely even drowned in teares for them for them Yea and for our selves too who are in mutuall enragements and various suddaine uproares through our misaffections and misinterpretations and misconstructions of every thing bloudy mindednesse takes place in the most and the casting about how to entrap and enwrap one another in miseries is the common misery of us all what calumniations are vented printed uncensured unpunished what jealousies each gainst others are every where closely fomented Charity the badge of Christianity and coverer of what may be covered is from us exiled and who can bee most of all uncharitable is the thing every where laboured after By this shall all men know saith the patterne and Patron of Charity our Lord Iesus even by this shall all men know that yee are my Disciples if yee love one another Iohn 13. 35. But with sorrow and shame enough too may it now be said All men by this may know We are none of Christs Disciples that wee hate one another So raging so outragious so notorious is our mutuall hatred Many knotts tye us none will hold us being one to another eye-soares if not heart-soares As strangers are our enter-viewers not as compatriots our conferences differences our * protestations detestations Reformation is intended deformation even in our Church assemblies and most remarkably there and unblushingly practised O! into what Schismes do we runne Into what Sects are we dissected Assunder are we rent one from the other yea where men rope together it is but in a sandy manner the least motion dissipateth parteth the sandily roped together and commotions not usuall in this age Amsterdam England Beloved who so is not troubled with these troubles hath no life no soule of Christianity at all left in him These and the like considerations as diverse others there are ought to incite us unto constant and instant prayer amidst them all in throngs upon us of these Nations at this time let us I say pray that from us they may yet timely be removed that the full and finall blow from heaven decide not our controversies in so much rancor steeped O! that it were come to the Character of the Church Christians Primitive age Corunum via una One heart one way and till it come to that troubles will involve us and when it comes to that to all the world about us may we be a President and an encouragement thereunto mee thinkes the many manifold and manifest preservations of our God should frame us all as one Man to bring this about to bee exemplary Christians to the whole world round about us I shall recite but a few yet these pregnant and of fresh memory and remarkable observation Can that Octogessimus octavus mirabilis annus that wondrous yeare of 88. ever be forgotten It was the yeare of Englands preservation and of Spaines and Romes abasement trouble was on us and we rid of trouble ere we knew it was so neare nor must the yeare 97. passe unremembred Spaine then had a second blow and England a second triumph As formerly the Armado stiled invincible was ruined so then were their forces and policies too shamefully defeated and the English fleete for another purpose designed brought upon them by the windes to sinke them into the waters or bring them Captivated unto our Land Those fell out in the dayes of the Maiden Queene famous Elizabeth for peace at home and victory abroad renowned The next fell out in King Iames his Reigne in the yeare 1605. The powder Treason was an hellish plot contrived most strangely Heaven went beyond hell in the businesse and providence outreached divellishnesse entangled them who long had the trap ready to have ruinated Protestancy for ever In the yeare 1639. were not these two Nations in one Island under one King the present breath of our Nostrils put upon a mutuall internecion and is not that turned into a most blessed reunion We are both the wonder the envie of Popish Territories God even then preserving us when we were ready to be seized on as a prey unto mercilesse teeth and to the Sepulcher throates of the Pontifician generation amongst us no stories can more represent the vigilancy of mercy over any people then can ours as David when hee was to encounter Goliah the stripling shepheard that Tower of flesh loaden with Armes and Instruments of death said He that delivered me from the Lion and the Beare will likewise from this uncircumcised Philistine deliver me so may we say He that delivered us from such and such troubles is the same still is willing and ready to deliver us from our troubles incumbent and imminent all these intricacies we are in and all the hovering and surrounding mischiefes what ever If our prayers can but lay hold on Gods promises no troubles can trouble us Call upon me in the day of trouble and I will deliver thee Will deliver thee Gods promises are as good as performances they are Yea and Amen in Christ unto Gods glory 2 Cor. 1. 20. Yea in the giving forth Amen in the performance certaine constant most firmly firme for evermore Our welfare and Gods glory are enwrapped in them No marvaile then is it that Prayer is so effectuall with God when by the heart hand mouth of faith unto him presented in the Name of Our Lord Iesus Christ when thus we are enabled to pray no marvaile that our prayer is to purpose effectuall No marvaile that God hearing Himselfe in us upon that audience giveth us deliverance in a way and manner to the whole world remarkeable And observe with mee that the Commandement Call upon me includeth
Christian must compose himselfe aright and bee ever readier to heare than to offer the sacrifice of fooles babling raw undigested prayers unto the GOD of awe and order In the third place know that prayers rightly modelled and moulded up will frame us to avoyd that defiler of all good exercises base hypocrisie It is before God that wee appeare in prayer whether it be in private or in publike alone in our closets or with others in our Families or in Church Assemblies God sees us heares us observes us there 's no dallying with him no deluding of him The Copy of a faire countenance and looks demurely composed cannot in his sight bee availeable whose eyes pierce all darknesse even that of hell and doe see through and through the thickest mantles and coverture of the closest hypocrisie even that which hypocrites in the very cabinets of their hearts cannot themselves discerne Further Prayer in conscience bindeth us that use it not to wrong any no not the easiest to be wronged to quit our hands speedily of what is others not our own Nay it importunes us to detest and abhorre even as hell all ravenous greedy oppressing courses None of which in whomsoever can possibly stand with the right profession of Christianity observe that expression of God in his Prophet Isai. 1. 15. When you spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you yea when you make many prayers I will not heare your hands are full of bloud In that consideration religious David said I will wash mine hands in innocency so will I compasse thine Altar O Lord Psalme 26. 6. Hence that exquisite counsell of Saint Paul advising us to pray every where lifting up holy hands without wrath or doubtings I Timothy 2. 8. Further yet prayer adviseth us to be rich to God-wards in the relievance of his poore Saints as now the distressed and dissipated Irish Protestants The ablest in power honour wealth is or ought to be a daily begging suitor unto God And can any think of God to be heard and answered in his petitions that suffers the godly to perish for want of their redundancies Suffers bleeding Ireland which makes our Kings heart bleed still to wallow and welter in bloud without stenching that bloudy issue Who so perish through want of our timely compassionate remedy their bloud I feare me will be put on our accompts against the reckoning day of the Doome finall Can our prayers worke our deliverance our eares and hearts rejecting the suites of bleeding Protestants or not seasonably relieving their almost desperate condition and humanely forlorne hopes The sentence is peremptory Prov. 21. 13. Who so stoppeth his eares at the cry of the poore hee also shall cry himselfe and shall not be heard On the contrary Blessed are the mercifull evermore blessed for they shall obtaine mercy Matth. 5. 7. Nothing so sure as their deliverance out of what ever troubles dangers cares feares In the fifth place Prayer it is that obligeth to diligence in hearing Gods Word and using aright the Sacraments of his Ordination For how thinke we that God will regard our prayers if we bee overly in the observation of his serious enjoyments will he receive our demands if we â—light over his commands if wee waite not constantly in his Sanctuary on his sacred behests and appointments Sixthly Prayer doth bind us all to the good behaviour one towards another nay more to the Reciprocation of enterchangeable Reconciliation in the occurrences of what ever differences and offences That passage is full and faire Matth. 5. 23 24. If thou bring thy gift to the Altar and there remembrest that thy brother hath ought against thee leave there thy gift before the Altar and goe thy way first be reconciled to thy brother and then come and offer thy gift If wee serve not one another in love which is an enjoyment Apostolicall neither our persons nor our prayers can please God When our Saviour had prescribed us a forme of Prayer he reassumeth and reinforceth that Petition in it Forgive us our debts as wee forgive our debtors for saith he If ye forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you but if yee forgive not men their trespasses Neither will your Father forgive your trespasses Matth. 6. 14 15. We have it thus related by Saint Marke chap. 1. verse 25. 26. When yee stand praying forgive if yee have ought against any that your Father also which is in Heaven may forgive you your trespasses Hold we to this and we shall be happy in deliverances but if thus cordially and really we pecce not up in peeces shall we be like a Potters vessell gracelesse uselesse in all troubles remedilesse which God avert and bring us all into the right tune and temper of Christianity and regular charity I now passe on to the last parcell in our Text Our due returne of glory to our deliverer out of all troubles We are never right till God ingenuously bee acknowledged by us to bee {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the remover of evills and of whatsoever is good the gratious bestower What we do must all be done to the glory of God 2 Cor. 10. 31. To this end were all things made in all creatures God sets forth his glory and in them all will he be glorified light cannot be hid and God of lights is the Father and in them all is represented to be glorified by Men the Sonne of God became man he is God manifested in the flesh and for that manifestation never can we men glorifie our God enough By this hath God made his wisdome manifest in finding out a way to satisfie his Justice exactly without the least prejudice at all to his Mercy Nay His Mercy is most evident in his Justice his Sonnes death on the Crosse was the price of our Redemption and the purchase of Heaven for us who had merited hell by the heinousnesse of our transgressions To be glorified will God againe send his Sonne and in our nature too but glorified To bee judged and to death sentenced for our offences was his first comming to bee the visible Judge both of quicke and dead shall his second comming be To be glorified God sets up and takes downe whom hee pleaseth Kings and Kingdomes are at his disposall to the Kings of the earth is hee terrible writes the Psalmist Psalm 76. 12. And the Courtly Prophet is plaine The Nation and Kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish yea those Nations utterly shall be wasted Esay 60. 12. To be glorified God remarkeably punisheth his owne transgressing people and at his owne house many times begins his judgement but ends in The ruine of his enemies Wee see that in part fulfilled and to the height at last shall it be made full As truely as I live all the earth shall bee filled with the glory of the Lord Num. 14. 21. Yet thinke not here beloved that God stands in need of being glorified by
and solid but what wee have from the dictates of his holy spirit This Lord our God this one Lord hath made all things for himselfe even the wicked for the day of evill Prov. 16. 4. Assuredly God will be glorified if not by us then on us if not for his mercies in our deliverance Surely then for his judgements in our sentencing to hell according to that in the Psalmist The wicked shall be turned into hell and all the Nations that forget God He that will not voluntarily glorifie God as the Father of mercies in the rigour of justice will our God glorifie himselfe in his eternall ruine If wee prove not the Heralds of his glory examples shall we be of his just indignation When his wrath is kindled but a little O blessed are they that in him repose their trust Psal. 2. 12. accursednesse shall enfetter all others in the chaines of everlasting darknesse O! my beloved in the Lord What ever we have been heretofore be this hence forward to the end of our pilgrimage and warfare on earth our mainest care never any more to receave the grace of God in vaine never turn the same into lasciviousnesse which Saint Iude fitly calls the denying of the only Lord God and our Lord Iesus Christ improve wee rather with all manner of alacrity and industriousnesse the talents thereof unto us concredited to the glory of our God upon our receiving the end of our faith even our endlesse salvation By words by works in our lives and at our deaths set wee forth the prayses of our gratious deliverer with the Psalmist from the ground of our hearts saying Blessed be the Lord God who daily loadeth us with his benefits even the God of our salvation he that is our God is the God of our salvation And unto God the Lord belong the issues from death Psalme 68. 19 20. Endangered is the Church of God at this day every where in the world and in this Island from the world divided endangered amongst Atheists Papists Sectaries in troubles are all right Christians involved O! now is the time of instant prayer for their gratious deliverance out of them all Call we heartily upon our God and his bowell mercies will tenderly reach us and savingly relieve us wee shall find and feele his timely succours there is yet balm in Gilead yet mercies and the plenteous redemption with our God He he it is that shall redeeme Israel from all his iniquities bring all his people every where out of all their depths of sins sorrowes miseries Psa. 130. Vtterly will he never forsake his own people the Israel of God but upon their unfained repentance and faith without hypocrisie settle them unremovably in himselfe and let them see even their full desires on al their malicious enemies and ungratious opposers for seeing God for the love of his Church made the world Sathan who labours the worlds ruine cannot with all his forces and devices ruinate the Church The eternall God the Lord of Armies and Mercies who from that roaring and circuiting Lion hath many times and many wayes delivered us from the hands of men his Captives and instruments how ever malitiously bent against us will still and still deliver us Our Petitions shall be prevalent with him for us and against them And after he hath given us deliverance upon deliverance here on earth he will possesse us in Heaven with our inheritance there our Inheritance immortall undefiled and that can never fade away 1 Pet. 1. 4. to this inheritance the King of glory bring us that there wee may for evermore glorifie him undâ—stractedly AMEN FINIS Post-Script W. A. D. D. Minor invidiâ I. G. D. D. Major contemptu Lesser than Envie greater than contempt From th' One and th' other let me be exempt I wish not Much with little am content So let My Yeares runne on My Life be spent There are some words mis-printed others mis-placed and the pointing here and there unobserved Pardon and amend friendly then peruse curteously The LORDS Prayer enlarged The PREFACE GRatious and glorious Father all good all mightie thou art with us alwayes present but thy Majestie principally demonstrates it selfe in and from Heaven in thee do we live move and have our being as thou hast created us of nothing so doest thou nourish maintaine defend us in the order and ranke of our creation We have our gratious enjoyment to betake our selves in prayer unto thee whose title is the hearer and answerer of prayers the helper of us to pray aright and the succourer of us too in right prayer to thy glory in our salvation Petion 1. O! cause thy Name and thy Selfe to bee made known upon Earth and thy saving health among all nations manifest thy selfe yet more more in and to the habitable world and be thou holy and heavenly Father by all of all conditions and sorts of Mankind honoured and glorified in the thoughts of our hearts in the words of our mouthes in the deeds of our holy lives and conversations even upon earth heavenly Petition 2. O! grant that the Scepter of thy Kingdome the word of thy power and the power of thy Word may bee efficacious and prevalent all the world over let us receive it humbly retaine it in our hearts closely grow up thrivingly by it in the cleare knowledge of thee and thy Christ day by day O let all Christian Churches agree in the truth of thy holy and lively word and be strengthened in grace by it and fitted by degrees for glory Petition 3. What thou willest be that accomplished and all the opposers of thy will confuted really and everlastingly confounded O be thy revealed will the rule of our thoughts words actions and thy very least becke our sway as it is of all thy holy Angels thy ministring spirits by thee sent forth to minister for them who shall bee the heyres of thy salvation Petition 4. What is needfull for this outward man let thy divine providence supply us withall and on that let our dependance be alwayes and in all things and teach us that lesson in what estate so ever we are with thine allotments to rest contented and in every thing to bee unto thy Majesty unfainedly thankfull Petition 5. O! look not severely upon our innumerous errors transgressions sins but cover them pardon them cast them all into the Seas bottome never to rise thence against us unto condemnation and separation from thee and give us all mutually forgiving hearts in the case of arising differences and offences Petition 6. We are in the midst of snares O let us never bee ensnared uphold us in thy feare and deliver us from the feare of all thine and our enemies Sathan sin death hell destruction The Doxologie WE are in thy Kingdom O with thy golden Scepter rule us we are under thy power O shelter us from all adversary forces we breath after the propagation of thy glory in our eternall salvation O manifest the same in thy due time and that in all clearenesse and fulnesse to our redeemed soules Amen So be it is our prayer Amen be it so will be thy ratification thou art faithfull and we are happie Amen Amen * Moaning the practice of Separatists c. 1 Iohn 5. 11.